


rushing in

by ignitesthestars



Category: Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: F/F, F/M, Forehead Touching, Friends to Lovers, Multi, OT3, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-16
Updated: 2017-04-16
Packaged: 2018-10-19 12:37:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10639995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ignitesthestars/pseuds/ignitesthestars
Summary: “Sara? Is everything all right?”Jaal’s voice is a low, sleepy rumble that hits Peebee in all the right places, except they’re definitely the wrong places when she’s talking to his girlfriend, who she might be a little bit in love with. At the same time as being a little bit in something with him, and honestly she doesn’t have a problem with the idea of a threesome, but there’s this hideous gaping thing in her chest that tells her she’s already all tangled up in strings.Better to walk away now before she trips them all up.(Or: in which Peebee is quite literally trying to escape from her own feelings, and Sara and Jaal are having none of it)





	

Sneaking out of the _Tempest_ shouldn’t be so difficult. Peebee has left hundreds of places in the dead of the night - hell, in mid day - without anyone the wiser. She doesn’t even have to worry about anyone shooting her this time.

A quiet voice in the back of her head suggests that it might have less to do with when she’s leaving and more to do with the fact that she’s leaving at all, and she - yeah, she’s ignoring that voice. You’re not supposed to have voices in your head anyway, she’s pretty sure.

 _It’s not forever_ , she tells herself, which is a new one. Usually, she can’t wait to see the back of a place, but there’s nothing usual about the _Tempest_. Or the people in it.

As if to prove her point, a quiet hiss announces the opening of the doors to Ryder’s quarters, and when had Peebee left the bridge anyway? She curses her own wandering thoughts as light pools on the floor below, plastering herself to the cold metal wall.

_Please be going to the bathroom. Or the kitchen! You want a snack you want a snack you want–_

“I know you’re there, Peebee.”

Very slowly, Peebee closes her eyes. Opening them again has the opposite of the hoped for effect; instead of this all being a dream, the Pathfinder has wandered out into the corridor in all her pyjama’d glory. There should be nothing sexy about an old shirt and a pair of shorts, but the neck of the shirt is slipping off one shoulder, and Sa - _Ryder’s_ muscled legs feel like they go on for days once the material stops.

She’s not even that tall. Peebee just has some really good memories involving those legs.

“A girl can’t go to the toilet?” she tries, hyperaware of the bag slung over her shoulder.

“With half her life in a bag?”

“Hey, you don’t know Asari bathroom life. Maybe I’m having issues.”

Peebee and Sara wince at the same time, probably for the same reason. Her issues are pretty widely known on board this ship, and they don’t have anything to do with going to the bathroom unless she’s tried some new angaran cuisine.

She’d told everyone that she was going to do better. That she trusted them. And she does trust them, loves them even, but there’s this thing under her skin that squirms every time she sees Sara (and not just Sara if she’s being completely honest) and it’s just.

Too hard. Wanting something so bad it leaves you breathless, and knowing you can’t even reach for it. It’s her own fault. The words _no strings_ haunt her along with the flicker of disappointment in pale blue eyes before Sara had agreed.

She would have had strings. She would have tied the both of them together, except Peebee had been her usual stupid, paranoid self, and missed her chance.

“I’m not going to stop you, if you really want to go,” Sara says softly, running a hand back through her hair. It’s a mess, all pushed up on one side, and Sara’s fiddling doesn’t help settle it down any. Peebee wants to run her own hands through it, wants to mess it up more, tug on it while they’re–

_I hate. Everything._

“I.” She stops. She doesn’t know how to start again, so she diverts the conversation instead. “How did you even know i was - up?” _Leaving?_

Sara gestures loosely at her head. “I have an AI connected to the ships systems sitting in my skull, Peebee. SAM warned me days ago that it seemed like you were getting ready to go, and he woke me up tonight.”

‘That is a gross breach of privacy.”

“A gross breach of privacy is having the AI in my head. Me keeping up with what’s happening on my ship is like, a moderate privacy breach. Maybe even mild.”

The corner of Peebee’s mouth twitches up despite herself, despite everything, and Sara offers her a cautious smile in turn. And then, because the universe hates her, a third voice enters the fray.

“Sara? Is everything all right?”

Jaal’s voice is a low, sleepy rumble that hits Peebee in all the right places, except they’re definitely the wrong places when she’s talking to his girlfriend, who she might be a little bit in love with. At the same time as being a little bit in something with _him_ , and honestly she doesn’t have a problem with the idea of a threesome (she’s an Asari after all) but there’s this hideous gaping thing in her chest that tells her she’s already all tangled up in strings.

Better to walk away now before she trips them all up. Except her feet are staying rooted to the spot as Jaal walks out into the light. Definitely shirtless. If there is a goddess, she wants Peebee dead.

“Not really,” Sara says softly, and that’s when Jaal looks up.

Peebee gives a sad little wave. She has to clear her throat before she speaks, because it feels very dry all of a sudden.

“Hi.”

Jaal’s gaze goes from her, to the bag, to Sara who has folded her arms across her chest. Not quite hugging herself, but not not doing it either.

“Ah,” he says, and from that single syllable Peebee deduces that he _knows_ , that they both know, that they’ve noticed her hopeless pining and have spoken about it, and if the ground could swallow her up right now that’d be just swell. “Hello, Peebee.”

‘Deer in the headlights’ is a human idiom, but it’s one that seems especially applicable right now. She can feel the urge to run fizzing up her legs, but they remain locked in place, just waiting for the train of terrible to crash right into her. The awkward glances, the gentle voices.

The rejection.

“So…” Sara shifts from foot to foot. Jaal’s arm curls around her waist on instinct, steadying her, and Peebee’s throat aches. “Okay, I’ve been trying to think of a way to bring this up for the past little while without freaking you out, but i think you’re already freaking out, so I’m just - I’m just gonna do it?”

She looks up at her stupid boyfriend when she says it. It’s impossible to tell what passes between them. Peebee didn’t want to know anyway.

“The thing is, we slept together - yeah, I’m going there - and it was great.” Sara’s face is getting steadily pinker. “It was amazing. I know we said no strings and I’m sure we both meant it at the time, but lately - and you made that comment about Jaal.”

There’s something else going on here. Something that Peebee can’t quite put her finger on, mostly because they’re both looking up at her and Sara is approximately the same colour as Jaal now, and there was definitely a mention of sex in there. And  the comment she’d made about Jaal? She hadn’t thought that Sara had been bothered by it. Had she been lying? Is this one whole big ‘step off my man’ disaster? Because she’s pretty sure she can get her legs moving again if that’s the case.

“You don’t have to stay! If you really want to go, or if we’ve misread things terribly, or you just need space, that’s fine. But we’d like you to stay. You don’t have to run from this.” There’s a note of what can only be called awkward desperation in Sara’s voice now, but on a level that Peebee doesn’t recognise. “I really want you to stay, Peebee.”

That tight feeling is back in her throat. She screws her face up, but that doesn’t help, so she clears it a couple of times. And yet, her voice still rasps when she can finally summon the will to speak. “I think you might’ve skipped a part there, Ryder. How’m I supposed to know if I’m running or not when you didn’t define what _this_ is?”

Sara blinks. “Oh.”

“ _Yeah_.”

“Sara and I have an interest in you that is both romantic and sexual.” Hearing Jaal’s voice is sort of like being punched in the face, but in a nice way? “This is something we have discussed between us, and while we have no expectation for you to reciprocate these feelings, we do feel that there is reason to…hope. When Sara says this, Peebee, she means us.”

He smiles at her, and it’s like the damn sun coming up. Sara makes a choked sound, but she’s not telling him to shut up, not denying any part of what he just said.

Peebee sits down.

They both start forward, somehow managing identical looks of concern on two very different sets of facial features. Her legs dangle over the edge of the ladder, and honestly, thinking hasn’t been doing her much good the last few days. So she shoulders her bag off and jumps, landing lightly in front of the two of them.

They don’t watch her warily. They watch her _wantingly_ , and it dawns on her that this isn’t the first time, that she knows these expressions, that she’s caught them in little glances and sidelong looks for days, weeks, longer. When she asks Sara to hand her a tool, when she invades the Tech Lab to hover over Jaal’s shoulder. When they eat together, fight together - hell, movie night was becoming its own special torture.

“Oh,” Peebee says softly.

Sara is still bright red, but she manages a gesture towards Jaal anyway. They both seem to be hovering, like it’s only the barest thread of willpower stopping them both from stepping towards her, into her.

“What he said,” Sara says weakly, and Peebee starts to laugh.

“This is stupid,” she announces. “You’re both _so stupid._ ”

And with that, she takes both of their hands, dragging them in towards her. There’s a warmth in her gut that, if she’s honest, wants a little more than handholding, but Peebee is starting to learn the advantages of not rushing into things.

Jaal’s expression is momentarily confused, but Sara’s laughter joining in seems to soothe him and - and maybe the touch of Peebee’s skin on his does as well. Sara hooks an arm around her neck, drawing her in until their foreheads touch and their breath mingles and Peebee can practically feel the Pathfinder’s wide grin radiating towards her.

“I never claimed to know what the hell I was doing,” Sara says. They smile goofily at each other for another second before she feels the rush of air from Jaal exhaling shudder over her cheek and this - this is newer, a little more awkward, but she turns her face into him, pressing her forehead to his cheek.

Little sparks of bioelectricity dance over her, and Sara, all three of them.

“I will admit,” he says roughly, “to a certain amount of idiocy in this matter. Perhaps we can now start to rectify that.”

Peebee squeezes her eyes shut again. And just like last time, when she opens them again, everything is still there.

They’re both still there.

She walks backwards, bumping their strangely configured group into Sara’s quarters. The words, when they come, are surprisingly easy.

“I’m game if you are.”

The bag stays on the landing until the next morning. Suvi’s cursing when she trips over it is surprisingly inventive.


End file.
